Standards for Sustainability

The weekly Verdigris blog by Laurel Brunner We’re gearing up for the next round of ISO meetings, including a couple of days devoted to environmental standards. We’re expecting a packed house, with participants from all over the world, so no pressure. Environmental standards are a delicate area, because some powerful vested interests have much to … Read more

Sustainability Reporting

The weekly Verdigris blog by Laurel Brunner The graphics industry is massive and yet the number of printing organisations with more than 500 employees is small. This means that very large customers buy their print from a host of small to medium sized enterprises (SMEs). Such organisations tend to be under the radar for most … Read more

The Shock of the New

The weekly Verdigris blog by Laurel Brunner Within the graphics industry there are numerous examples of companies’ efforts to improve energy generation and management. And there is ISO 50001, the standard for energy management to which companies such as Agfa and Kodak have certified compliance. But Fujifilm has gone far beyond these efforts at its … Read more

The Meaning of Life

The weekly Verdigris blog by Laurel Brunner Life Cycle Analysis (LCA) is expensive, takes a long time and can be fiendishly complex. Companies who undertake it generally do so in order to demonstrate the environmental credentials of their product or service. But there are other more nuanced reasons for doing LCA, such as providing proof … Read more

Green fashion

The weekly Verdigris blog by Laurel Brunner Arguments for using digital technology for textile printing are pretty much the same as for using it in any other print sector. Markets appreciate bespoke short run options, customisation and on demand production. Digital printing cuts waste and improves cost control through inventory minimisation. Collapsing traditional supply chains … Read more

Waterwash flexo plates

The weekly Verdigris blog by Laurel Brunner Kodak CEO Jeff Clarke made a bold admission during the company’s drupa press conference. He said that: “the print industry is a dirty industry … one of the things we can do is to clean up the dirty chemicals.” A key technology for achieving this goal is water … Read more

Environmental policies

The weekly Verdigris blog by Laurel Brunner Changing behaviours is what environmental awareness and regulation is all about. The graphics industry has come a long way as far as sustainability goes, steadily improving its environmental impact for the last few decades. This has mostly been to improve its bottom line, cutting waste and process inefficiencies … Read more

Preparing for drupa 2020

The weekly Verdigris blog by Laurel Brunner Now that drupa 2016’s over, we can start hoping that at drupa 2020 the environmental will be in sharper focus. This year’s organisers missed a great opportunity to take the sustainability lead. Drupa 2016’s attendance and sales numbers show that print is in rude health. Investment into print … Read more

Paperlab Update

The weekly Verdigris blog by Laurel Brunner At drupa we were privileged to interview Seiko Epson’s Minoru Usui, CEO and president of the company since 2008. Mr Usui outlined his vision for Epson’s amazing PaperLab technology. PaperLab is an integrated system for producing new paper from waste paper without using water. PaperLab shreds office paper … Read more

Energising

The weekly Verdigris blog by Laurel Brunner At the recent ISO working group meetings for graphics technology, a new standard was introduced for improving the environmental impact of digital production printing devices. The new standard is closely related to the ISO 20690 document for measuring the energy consumption of this sort of device. However, the … Read more